Brown, Elspeth H.

Biography

Professor Brown’s research concerns three main areas: the cultural history of capitalism; the history and theory of photography; and queer and trans* history and theory in the US and Canada. Methodologically, current work focuses on oral history; reading visual evidence; and writing for a broader public. She has received fellowship support from the Getty Research Institute, the Library of Congress Kluge Center, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Smithsonian Institution, the American Philosophical Society, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. She is the author of The Corporate Eye: Photography and the Rationalization of American Commercial Culture, 1884-1929 (Johns Hopkins 2005) and Sexual Capital: A Queer History of Modeling, 1909-1983 (forthcoming, Duke University Press), as well as co-editor of Cultures of Commerce: Representation and American Business Culture, 1877-1960 (Palgrave, 2006) and Feeling Photography (Duke University Press, 2014).

Research Interest

cultural history of capitalism; the history and theory of photography; and queer and trans* history and theory in the US and Canada